New Releases by D. H. Lawrence

A multi-generational family saga that chronicles the lives of three generations of the Brangwen family on their Nottinghamshire farm—and the riveting prequel to Women in Love—from one of the greatest and most controversial writers of the 20th century. Rooted in an agrarian past, Tom and Lydia Brangwen and their descendants find themselves navigating a rapidly changing world—a world of unprecedented individualism, alienation, and liberation. Banned after an obscenity trial in 1915 for its frankness about sexuality, THE RAINBOW was most remarkable for the pathbreaking journeys of its female characters, particularly that of Ursula Brangwen, whose destiny Lawrence explored further in his next novel, Women in Love. In its surface drama, in its capacious and expansive rhythms that so resemble the rhythms of nature itself, THE RAINBOW is one of the world’s great examples of the multi-generational family saga. But the large claim that Lawrence’s masterpiece has made on the attention of readers and critics stems less from this fact than from the deeper parallel history he provides for the Brangwens—a history of the growth of their souls, moving in a great arc from sensuality to self-awareness and freedom.

Sketches of Etruscan Places contains seven essays D. H. Lawrence wrote in 1927 after visiting several Etruscan cities in central Italy. Six were published posthumously in 1932 as Etruscan Places; ''The Florence Museum'' is published for the first time here. Some appeared in magazines in Lawrence''s lifetime, but he expressed a wish that they be published in a volume with the photographs he had collected; in fact, only twenty of the forty-five illustrations here reproduced with Lawrence''s own captions were included in 1932. Eight essays about Florence and the Tuscan countryside form the second part of this volume. The texts have been established by checking manuscripts, typescripts, proofs and periodical and book publications. The introduction gives the genesis, publication, textual history and reception of the essays.

At D.H. Lawrence''s suggestion, a nurse and author, Mollie Skinner wrote about a young Englishman''s reactions to late nineteenth-century Western Australia; then Lawrence completely rewrote it. This is the first critical edition of that novel, The Boy in the Bush. The reading text eliminates publishers'' censorship and the miscopyings of typists and typesetters. The compositional development and the variants of the typescripts and first editions are given in the textual apparatus. Explanatory notes distinguish local and historical material. Appendices include maps, an outline history of the colony and two of Lawrence''s essays about the collaboration, one of which appears here for the first time in English.

Movements in European History was written by D. H. Lawrence during 1918 and 1919 in response to Oxford University Press''s invitation to prepare a textbook for schools. It is a vivid sketch of European history from ancient Rome to the early twentieth century, remaining significant in the canon of Lawrence''s work as the only school textbook he ever wrote. Crumpton''s introduction describes the genesis, publication and reception of the book, gives an account of the little-known Irish edition of 1926 which suffered much censorship, and identifies and analyses Lawrence''s methods of using the source-books on which his writing was based. This edition uses the surviving manuscript to present a text as close to that which Lawrence wrote and corrected in proof as is now possible.

Apocalypse is D. H. Lawrence''s last book, written during the winter of 1929-30 when he was dying. It is a radical criticism of our civilisation and a statement of Lawrence''s unwavering belief in man''s power to create ''a new heaven and a new earth''. Ranging over the entire system of his thought on God and man, on religion, art, psychology and politics, this book is Lawrence''s final attempt to convey his vision of man and the universe. Apocalypse was published after Lawrence''s death, and in a highly inaccurate text. This edition is the first to reproduce accurately Lawrence''s final corrected text on the basis of a thorough examination of the surviving manuscript and typescript. In the introduction the editor has discussed the writing of Apocalypse and its place in Lawrence''s works, its publication and reception, and the significance of Lawrence''s other writings on the Book of Revelation.